Two minor girls were allegedly sexually assaulted by teenagers – also minors – in two separate but shockingly similar incidents in Jharkhand and Rajasthan on Monday.
While a seven-year-old girl was allegedly raped by a teenager in Rajasthan's Bharatpur district, a class six student was
allegedly gang-raped by four minor boys, all students of the same institute, at a government school in Lohardaga.

The involvement of minors in heinous crimes like rape has led to an increasing clamour across the country for their trial as adults, specially after the December 16 gang rape and murder of a paramedic student in a moving bus in Delhi.

One of the convicts in the case, a minor, was treated by a juvenile court and sentenced to three years in a correctional facility while the adults were sentenced to death.

In two other gang rape cases in Mumbai's Shakti Mills locality, three adults were awarded death sentence while the two minors involved in the incident are being tried as juveniles.

Police in the United States earlier this year decided to try a 17-year-old, involved in a deadly shooting incident at a school in Philadelphia, as an adult in view of the gravity of the crime.

Sikri police station in-charge Vijay Singh Meena said the incident occurred at around 8 pm when the victim's parents were visiting some relatives nearby.

The village where the rape took place is around 180km from capital Jaipur.

The accused entered the house on the pretext of offering sweets to the victim and pounced on her.

He gagged with a piece cloth so that she could not shout, said the police.

"A case under Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act (Posco) and other relevant sections of the IPC has been filed. The accused escaped from the village and search for him is on," Meena added.

"A search operation has been launched to detain the accused in the incident."

The accused are known to the victim and she had voluntarily accompanied the boys for a stroll when they forced her into a room of the school and allegedly sexually assaulted her.

The incident came to light after the victim lodged a complaint against four teenagers at the Lohardaga town police station on Tuesday afternoon. The accused are aged between 13 and 15 years.

Lohardaga is around 80 km from capital Ranchi.

Lohardaga police said that the girl complained of severe pain in lower abdomen on Tuesday morning. On being prodded by her parents, she narrated her ordeal to them who later accompanied her to the police station and lodged the FIR.

According to the complaint lodged by the victim, one of the accused is her classmate who had introduced her to the other three a few months back.

"I had gone out with them several times so I trusted them. On Monday evening we were strolling when they forcefully took me inside a room of the school and raped me," the victim said in the complaint.

According to police, the girl used to help one of the teachers of the school -- who resided within the campus – in her household work. She lives in a nearby locality with her parents.

During course of investigation, police learnt that the boys managed to open a room of the school by breaking one of the window panes.